NEWS

Listing of shares by start-ups and small and medium enterprises without initial public offering is not aimed to drive away retail investors.

Entities failing to raise needed capital after exhausting all available fund raising options alone shall list on this special platform, said UK Sinha, Chairman, Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI).

DEBT-STRESSED

Sinha said this while delivering a lecture on ‘How SMEs and start-ups can raise money from the market’ at the Asian School of Business here on Wednesday.

Kerala State Planning Board and the Asian School of Business co-hosted the event.

Quoting HSBC Global Research, he said that 70 per cent of the small and medium enterprises have been debt-stressed as against 30 per cent of large and medium corporates.

Working capital cycles have stretched to 130 days in comparison to 90 days for mid-corporates. Defaults on working capital borrowing abounded and so did financial risks.

SEBI has since intervened meaningfully with its initiatives for finding alternative sources of risk capital for SMEs.